Crafting Rules
Certain Skills enable you to create items from parts and materials. To do so, you must have the materials, as determined by the GM, available. You then test the appropriate Skill (e.g. Chem-Use or Trade) applying any bonuses or penalties due to the quality of materials, environmental factors and anything else as determined by the GM. On a success, you generate the item. Note that the qualities/finish/usefulness of the item improves for each degree of success gained. Failing by three degrees indicates you have ruined some of the materials. Failing by five or more degrees indicates that you have completely ruined all of the Skill Groups materials and must start over from scratch. Note that the time it takes to create the item is determined by the GM. = Using Crafting Skills = The creation of new items can be long, exhausting work. An agri-worker or sculptor alike may toil for months before their efforts come to fruition. Just the design of particularly complex items may take months, to say nothing of their construction. Yet in the end, a patient artisan may be rewarded with a unique item whose appearance, attributes or abilities far exceed those of lesser craftsmanship. Similarly, you may wish to improve upon an item already in your possession, either by upgrading its functionality or improving its Craftsmanship. The Acolyte begins the Crafting process by defining the item he wishes to create in defined game terms. The GM uses this information to assign a Difficulty, Duration and Cost to the task. Both the player and GM consider a variety of choices or circumstances that may adjust these assigned factors. Next, the Acolyte makes appropriate Skill Tests after completion of a certain duration of work, and make decisions about how to best use his successes. If all goes well, the Acolyte’s labour will result in a prized item of first-rate workmanship. Step One: Define the Task There is an enormous difference between adding a fire selector to an autopistol and creating a custom powersword, or between cooking a quick meal for a group of hungry Acolytes and preparing a fine banquet worthy of Imperial nobles. You must very clearly define your goals in concrete game terms so the GM can accurately determine the Difficulty of creating the item. You should think about basic elements, such as the base item, additional or enhanced attributes and abilities, and even reduced performance in some cases. In addition, you should specify any statistics different from those of the base item: weight, special qualities, Armour Points, or anything else appropriate to the task. It’s the GMs responsibility to ensure that the player has adequately defined the task or item, including all game effects. Should either GM or player miss anything in this step, it is assumed to be the same as a basic item of Common Craftsmanship. Step Two: Assign Difficulty, Duration and Cost Most citizens of the Imperium regard technology as mysterious and beyond the reach of any but the most devoted of the Cult Mechanicus. Craftsmen, however, bridge the gap between the mundane and mystical, allowing them to create items different or superior to the norm. Even with these Skills, there are certain tasks that are simply impossible, such as creating a plasma gun out of primitive components or improving a power sword with crude tools. While it’s easy for the GM to say “no” to a player’s request, you may find that this eventually stifles their creativity. A better option might be to assign a very challenging Difficulty, Duration or Cost to the task, allowing them to try even if the odds of success are low. You should also consider what the item will do to the balance of your campaign. If you don’t want your Acolytes running around brandishing power swords with plasma pistols built into the hilts, make this decision now instead of trying to take them away after the fact. At the same time, work with the Acolyte to apply the “common sense factor” to the project. If the goal is to create a lightweight, assault version of a basic weapon, it doesn’t really make sense to double the range, as carbines typically have shorter range than their full-sized counterparts. Increasing the Damage for a weapon would also tend to reduce the number of shots per clip to make room for the larger rounds. The GM should assign an appropriate Difficulty, Duration, and Cost to the task or item the Acolyte defined in the previous step. Make sure to look at factors that differ from the base item, such as weight, size and performance. Difficulty The Difficulty in creating an object works the same way as the Difficulty in any other Test. Thus, wiring two power cells together to make a larger power supply would be much less difficult than tinkering with the innards of an auspex to extend its range. Crafting Difficulties Table and some of the expanded Trade Skill descriptions give guidelines in assigning Difficulties to projects. Duration Along with a Difficulty, each task also has an associated Duration. Keep in mind that difficult tasks need not necessarily have long durations, and easy tasks may very well take a long time. A miner digging a trench to expose an underlying layer of rock in hard-packed soil is not terribly complex, but without help, it’s likely to take quite some time. Unlike Difficulty, where the GM assigns a flat modifier to the task, Duration represents a range of time, since the Acolyte can’t anticipate all the difficulties—or lack of inspiration—he may encounter along the way. The Acolyte should roll 2d10 and consult Crafting Durations Table: Dividing Tasks: For tasks with Durations of months or years, dividing them into logical components may allow a number of tradesmen to focus on the portions most suited to their Skills. A wright may work on the control system of a speeder while a smith forges armoured plates for the hull. While this technique can save time for the overall duration of the project, it adds time to each portion. Each craftsman may accomplish their individual task well, but they may not integrate well into the final product. The GM and Acolyte must work together to divide the job into reasonable sub-tasks, though the GM has final approval for this process. If the Acolytes were looking to improve the performance of their groundcar, they might agree with the GM that this could be divided into work on the engine and work on the frame and suspension. Once, divided, the GM assigns a new Duration and Difficulty for each sub-task. After defining the sub-tasks, add an additional task for combining all the parts together. The Difficulty of this task is equal to that of the most difficult sub-task. For each subtask over two, increase the Difficulty by one level. Thus, if a Challenging (+0) task has been divided into four sub-tasks, the Difficulty of combining them would be Hard (–20). If this would increase the Difficulty beyond Very Hard (–30), then the craftsman must reduce the number of sub-tasks. The larger the number of individual contributors, the more difficult it will be to combine them in the end. Cost Determining the Cost of an item can be challenging, especially in cases where there are few examples of similar items, but you’ll quickly develop a knack for it. In most cases, determining Cost falls into two broad categories: constructing an item out of raw materials or combining existing items into a hybrid. Penning a map or building a bunker are examples of the former, and constructing a boltgun combined with a hand flamer would fit into the second category. For instances where the new item is a combination of existing ones, estimating Cost is relatively straightforward. Add the costs of the basic items, and then add a reasonable cost for the materials necessary to combine them from Material Costs Table. Thus, if an Acolyte wanted to build an auspex display into his carapace helmet so it would read out on his visor, the GM can add the costs of the two items plus the cost of some complex components. The Cost for building things from scratch can require more creativity, but needn’t be intimidating. The key is to start from a known point and modify appropriately. Table 9-6: Material Costs is intended to be a starting point and guide rather than a painful exercise in maths. If your Acolytes are building a watchtower from steel beams, feel free to approximate the amount of steel required, arriving at a cost that makes sense rather than painstakingly researching structural design. Step Three: Make Adjustments A number of factors can affect the Difficulty, Duration, or Cost of a task, some of which may be imposed by circumstance and some of which are chosen by the Acolyte. These include adjusting the Duration to make tasks easier or shorter, the tools or workspace used and the quality of raw materials. You may voluntarily adjust Duration by one-step up or down for a corresponding adjustment to the Difficulty. Thus, for each step up in Duration, the GM-assigned Difficulty goes down by one level. However, if you decide the task will take more time than you have, you can also do the opposite, decreasing the Duration by one-step and increasing the Difficulty by one level. Any adjustment of Duration below “minutes” has no effect, and any adjustment above “years” multiplies the Duration roll by 2. Any change in Difficulty below Easy (+30) has no effect, and any shift beyond Very Hard (–30) means that the task is beyond the Acolyte’s current abilities. If the Acolyte has access to tools, workspace or materials of Good or Best Craftsmanship, the Difficulty or Duration of a project can also be reduced. Items of Good Craftsmanship can reduce Difficulty by one-step. Items of Best Craftsmanship reduce the Difficulty and Duration by one-step. Use the highest Craftsmanship modifier only in the case of multiple items that would affect the task. Thus if a tech-priest had access to a forge world Mechanicus workshop of Best Craftsmanship and also raw materials of Good Craftsmanship, only the modifier for the workshop would apply. Step Four: Tests You Test the appropriate Trade Skill at the end of the Time Interval indicated by Table 9-5: Crafting Durations. This assumes you spend a full six hours per day—or the entire Time Interval for shorter durations—working on the project. If you spend less than the requisite amount of time per day, that day does not count towards earning a Test. Success on the roll reduces the time to complete the job by one Time Interval, but degrees of success or a failure of three or more has additional effects. For each degree of success, you may either reduce the time necessary to complete the project by an additional Time Interval or apply it towards improving the final Craftsmanship of the work. Failures of three or more degrees indicate that a setback has occurred. This both adds one Time Interval to the remaining Duration and subtracts one from the accumulated degrees of success. Note successive failures can lead to a negative total for degrees of success. Improving Craftsmanship You can’t make a silk purse from a sow’s ear, nor a Best Craftsmanship target pistol from a Poor Craftsmanship underhive auto snub. An item’s Craftsmanship may only ever improve by rebuilding it. The GM should assign a Difficulty one-step higher than creation of the existing item, but a Duration of one-step lower, adding in additional material costs as appropriate. An existing item’s Craftsmanship can only ever go up by one level, no matter how good the Test. Cooperation Craftsman can combine their efforts for particularly complex or long tasks, provided the GM feels such assistance is realistic. While a large number of miners could very well work together on a new tunnel, only one technomat could reasonably work at soothing the machine-spirit of a small cogitator. These rules add to the Assistance rules on page 185 in Dark Heresy for purposes of Crafting and Investigation. When several workers with the appropriate Trade Skill combine their efforts, one is designated as the primary craftsman and the others as subordinate craftsmen. When counting the results of a Test, the primary craftsman counts only success or failure, without taking degrees of success into account. Each subordinate’s success then counts as a degree of success for purposes of Craftsmanship or reducing the time for completion. If any individual fails his Test by three or more degrees, all other rolls for that Time Interval are considered failures in addition to the normal setbacks! You will quickly find that too many subordinates slow progress considerably. Note that brute labour, such as workers carrying raw materials or slag, do not count as Cooperation; only the skilled work of another tradesman uses this system. Setting Things Aside The Inquisition seldom allows its Acolytes much free time to pursue their own trades, so it’s likely they may have to set their tasks aside while the needs of the Imperium occupies their time. So long as they don’t set things aside for too long, it won’t result in a setback. However, if you set aside a task for a period of time equal to the next higher Time Interval, then you suffer a setback as if you’d failed a Test by three or more degrees. The project suffers a second setback if put aside for a Time Interval two higher than the original. Additional setbacks occur at each higher Time Interval. So a task with a Duration of weeks would suffer the first setback after being put aside for one month, and a second setback after being ignored for one year. For Time Intervals of greater than one year, simply double the previous one. Step Five: Complete the Task After rolling the final success, the work is complete. However, simply completing the task doesn’t tell you the quality of the end result. The degrees of success accumulated throughout the task process have the capacity to yield a result of superior—or inferior—Craftsmanship. Tally the total degrees of success allocated to improving Craftsmanship, subtract the number of setbacks, and look up the result on Determining Craftsmanship Table. Failure There may come a time for particularly difficult projects when it becomes clear that a substandard result, or even failure, is unavoidable. If you accumulate more than five negative degrees of success, the project has failed and all materials utilised in it are lost. You may also voluntarily abandon a project at any time during the Tests, yielding the same result. Category:Playing the Game